1. Teach the learner about ADHD and the need to self-monitor behavior.

2. Teach yourself and others about ADHD to increase comprehension and accommodation of impulsive behavior.

3. Teach yourself and others about ADHD to increase comprehension and accommodation of excessive talking.

4. Urge the learner to avoid ingesting any substance (e.g., drugs, alcohol, cold remedies, etc.) that might further alter their capacity and ability to keep self-control.

5. Create challenges in designated tasks to increase interest and motivation.

6. Urge the learner to create an understanding of themselves and those around him/her. Get the learner to periodically step back and ask themselves, “Am I bothering others?”

7. Praise the learner for demonstrating appropriate behavior based on the duration of time they can be successful. As the learner shows success, slowly increase the duration of time required for reinforcement.

8. Urge the learner to monitor their impulsivity. Awareness should lessen impulsive behaviors.

9. Create classroom rules: • Complete every assignment. • Complete assignments quietly. • Remain in your seat. • Finish tasks. • Meet task expectations. Examine rules often. Praise students for following the rules.

10. Assess the appropriateness of the task to ascertain (a) if the task is too easy, (b) if the task is too complicated, and (c) if the duration of time scheduled to finish the task is sufficient.

11. Show the learner, after telling them to stop talking, the reason why they should not be talking.

12. Minimize distracting stimuli(e.g., place the learner on the front row, give a carrel or “office” away from distractions, etc.). This should be used as a way to lessen distractions, not as a punishment.

13. Show the learner that they may be trying too hard to fit in and that they should relax and wait until more appropriate times to interact.

14. Show the learner why it is essential not to intrude on others. Assist them in understanding that it is impolite, that they might hurt someone’s feelings, etc.

15. Provide the learner sufficient chances to speak in the classroom, talk to other students, etc. (i.e., enthusiastic students need many chances to contribute).

16. Get all the appropriate learning materials assembled to work on a project, task, etc., to lessen the need to ask for learning materials.

17. Get the learner to be the leader of a cooperative learning experience if they possess a mastery of skills or an interest in that area.

18. Plan essential learning activities at times when the learner is most likely to keep attention (e.g., one hour after medication, 45 minutes after lunch, first thing in the morning, etc.).

19. Select a peer to model appropriate behavior for the learner.

20. Get the learner to question any directions, explanations, or instructions before starting a task to reinforce comprehension and avoid interrupting peers later to ask questions.

21. Consider using a classroom management app. Click here to view a list of apps that we recommend.

22. Consider using an adaptive behavior management app. Click here to view a list of apps that we recommend.

23. Consider using Alexa to help the student learn to behave appropriately. Click here to read an article that we wrote on the subject.

24. Click here to learn about six bonus strategies for challenging problem behaviors and mastering classroom management.

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Alfred Binet – a French psychologist, was the first to define mental age and launch the intelligence test in 1905. With his student Theodore Simon, he developed the Binet-Simon Scale, which acted as the basis for the Stanford-Binet test. This test uses five factors of cognitive ability to measure intelligence. These factors are knowledge, fluid reasoning, working memory, visual-spatial processing, and quantitative reasoning. This test measures both non-verbal and verbal responses. Each of these five factors is assigned a weight, and the collective score is often condensed to a ratio called the IQ or intelligence quotient.

If a child’s chronological and mental ages are identical, he has an IQ of 100, which refers to average intelligence. However, if a 10-year old scores 130 on an IQ test, he would have a mental age of 13 (the age-appropriate average score is 100; thus, MA = (130/100) × 10 = 13). As adults’ average mental age doesn’t increase past age 18, an adult who takes an IQ test is allocated the chronological age of 18.

Stanford-Binet test’s early versions computed a child’s mental age based on how well he performed on the test. But the idea of mental age is fairly debatable. Supporters of mental age deem that even though the rate of children’s intellectual development differs, the path of such development is fundamentally the same for all of them. They also consider mental age less meaningful for adults since adult intelligence changes slightly from year to year.

Opponents of mental age disagree with the concept and believe that intellectual development doesn’t follow a linear path. They say some people may develop specific intellectual abilities faster compared to their other intellectual skills. For instance, a 15-year-old may understand advanced college-level math but read quite below his grade level. Even intelligence tests have triggered a lot of controversy regarding what types of mental abilities make up intelligence and if the IQ represents these abilities adequately. 

Some people also argue that such tests’ construction and standardization procedures are culturally biased. Many critics believe that intelligence tests favor students from more prosperous backgrounds and discriminate against those who’re less privileged socially, ethnically, or racially. As a result, psychologists have tried to design culture-free tests that truly reflect a student’s native ability. One such test was Leon Rosenberg’s Johns Hopkins Perceptual Test (in the early 1960s) to evaluate preschool children’s intelligence by letting them try to match random forms. It avoided ordinary geometric forms, such as squares, circles, and triangles, because some children may be more familiar with them than others are.

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Emergent literacy starts long before a kid’s official lessons in school and continues through the preschool year. From the day they’re born, kids are already in the process of learning a language and becoming literate. As they grow and develop, their language skills and speech become more and more complex. They become skilled at understanding and using language to express their feelings and thoughts and communicate with others. 

During their early speech and language development, kids learn skills vital to developing literacy (writing and reading). They observe and interact with print (such as magazines, books, and grocery lists) in everyday situations (like at home, at a daycare center, in preschool, etc.) prior to starting elementary school. Parents can notice their kids’ growing admiration and enjoyment of print as they begin to identify words that rhyme, point out street signs and logos, draw with crayons, and name a few letters of the alphabet. Slowly, kids start combining what they know about listening and speaking with what they know about print, thus becoming all set to learn to read and write.

Emergent literacy skills the kids gain through their listening and talking during the preschool period prepare them to learn to read and write during their early elementary school years. As a result, kids who start school with weaker verbal abilities are more prone to experience problems learning literacy skills than their counterparts who have more potent verbal abilities. A spoken language skill strongly linked to early reading and writing is phonological awareness. This refers to the recognition that separate speech sounds create words. For instance, the word ‘dog’ is made of three sounds, namely d, aw, g. There are various oral language activities that display kids’ natural development of phonological awareness, including

•         isolating sounds or developing basic phonemic awareness, such as learning that ‘fr’ is the first unit of sound in ‘frame,’ ‘friend,’ and ‘freeze’ or ‘f’ is the first sound in ‘fish.’
•         rhyming, like ‘cat-mat-hat’
•         alliteration, such as ‘picture perfect,’ ‘quick question,’ ‘rocky road,’ or ‘money matters.’

As they get involved in sound play, the kids finally learn to divide words into their separate sounds and map them onto printed letters, which lets them start learning to read and write. Though young kids don’t relate all letters to their specific sounds, they can note acceptable phonemes within reading and writing. For instance, ‘fr’ is an acceptable phoneme, while ‘tsw’ isn’t, as there’s no word in English that combines those letters to make a single sound. 

Thus, emergent literacy skills include the kids’ knowledge of acceptable phonemes, which boosts their phoneme awareness. This comprehension is extremely vital when they enter school and begin to be trained in reading. It has been observed that kids who perform well on sound awareness tasks become successful writers and readers, while those struggling with these tasks often don’t.

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Emergent curriculum is based on the principle that kids are most successful at learning when courses and programs align with their interests, requirements, strengths, and lived realities. Teachers committed to this philosophy observe children throughout their day and use the resultant notes for constructing individualized and thoughtful curriculum content. This is followed by offering meaningful learning opportunities to support the vital developmental skills relevant to kids of a particular age group.

When ongoing opportunities for practice cause skill mastery, teachers react by augmenting the learning experience by planning and implementing progressively challenging tasks. As kids repeatedly tackle and master these “attainable challenges,” they start considering themselves as proficient learners. Additionally, the alignment of course content with social realities and individual interests authenticates all types of diversities and inspires an enduring passion for learning.

Both kids and adults have initiatives and make decisions in an emergent curriculum. This power to affect curriculum directions and decisions means that course content is sometimes negotiated between what kids find interesting and what adults recognize to be essential for their education and development. Course ideas typically materialize from responding to the questions, interests, and concerns produced within a specific environment, by a particular set of people, at a definite time. Therefore, an emergent curriculum isn’t based on the kids’ interests alone. Instead, teachers and parents have interests worth bringing into the course. By incorporating the concerns and values of all the adults involved, such a curriculum helps the classroom culture to evolve.

Teachers play a crucial role in an emergent curriculum. In the beginning, they utilize their knowledge of child development theory and pursue the kids’ lead by providing materials for them to actively explore as a mode of inspiring in-depth understanding of a specific topic of interest. Once kids achieve mastery, the teachers enrich their learning interests by adding new materials that support or suggest new ideas. At this phase, the teacher scaffolds the kids’ learning to bring them to a new level of understanding.

An emergent curriculum also needs teachers to document learning experiences. Such documentation helps teachers realize where the curriculum stands and gives them ideas about where it could go next. It helps kids understand their own learning process and lets their parents get solid representations of their developmental growth.

Project work is another vital component of programs practicing the emergent curriculum. Using projects, which can involve the entire class or a small group, kids can get in-depth knowledge of a topic over days or weeks. In a classroom that practices emergent curriculum successfully, projects often focus on answering kids’ questions like “Why do different things have different colors?” or “What happens to the water after it’s used to water the plants?” or “What types of homes do animals live in?” After noting kids’ questions, teachers can create projects that help answer those questions.

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There are things that a parent who is dealing with this situation can do to help their child with their progress. Here are some suggestions that you might want to incorporate into your daily routine. 

Play

There are numerous games and activities that you can use to help develop these skills. Taking time out to play with tactile toys, like slime or silly putty can develop fine motor skills. You can have them help you work in the garden, too, because digging in the dirt helps with motor skills. 

Head out for a day at the playground and let them get into some fun at the playground. Interacting with other kids and doing activities that require motor skills will help them build those critical skills. It also helps them with social skills, like sharing and understanding the importance of rules. 

Use Pictures

Children with delayed development can find it hard to understand verbal instructions. Their lack of understanding may be frustrating to you, but it is just as frustrating for them. You may need to try different ways of teaching them and explaining things. 

It might be helpful to take a more visual approach to impart information to your child. You can use charts or pictures to detail their daily routine and tasks you need them to do. Then, when you give them the instructions, you can point as you detail what you need from them. 

Communication

Communication is vital not only with the child but with the individuals who work with the child. This can include teachers or development counselors. By keeping them in the loop and understanding what they are doing on their end, you will be able to better support each other in helping your child develop the skills they need in their life. 

You will also want to stay in constant contact with your doctors, as well, so that you are up to date on the child’s checkups. This will also help make sure that you know the development milestones that you and the child are working on reaching. 

Concluding Thoughts

Having a child with developmental delays is challenging, but it is not something that can’t be worked with. Using the suggestions above, you can give your children confidence and help them achieve the skills they need.

The post Child Development Delays – Tips To Help Your Child Overcome Them appeared first on The Edvocate.

As a parent, would it be a good idea to tell your child’s coach about these differences? There are various factors to consider when answering this question. In this article, we will be discussing these differences and whether or not telling a coach about them would benefit your child. 

Are Other Children Likely To Notice These Differences?

As we have already discussed, various learning and thinking differences could affect your child’s attitude and ability. Also, there are different degrees of difference that your child might experience. 

The most important question that you should ask yourself is whether or not the other children on the field will notice these differences. If the answer is no, you do not have to tell the coach. However, if they will notice, it is recommended that you explain the situation to the person in charge. 

What Does Your Child Think?

Your child’s opinion is critical when it comes to these sorts of things. Because of this, you should ask your child whether or not they want everybody to know about their differences. At the same time, it is also vital that you explain why confiding in the coach may be beneficial. 

If your child does not want the coach or the other children to know about their differences, do not mention it. Going against their opinion may leave them feeling insignificant or betrayed. 

You could also simply go through one season and see how your child copes. If they are struggling at any point, discussing options with the coach will always be a possibility. 

Will It Help?

You must ask yourself whether or not confiding in the coach will help your child. If you do not think that it will make that much of a difference, telling them may not be the best option. 

On the other hand, if your child’s differences call for less playing time or constant supervision, you should mention the situation to the coach. 

Concluding Thoughts

Many parents wonder whether or not confiding in the coach about their child’s learning differences is a good idea. Before deciding, they should ask themselves whether or not it will help their child in the long run. Parents can also ask their children whether or not they want everybody to know about their differences before deciding to tell the coach.

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Some key characteristics that kids display in a concrete operational stage are:

•         Classification: As their vocabulary and experiences grow, the kids build schemata and organize objects differently. They also comprehend classification hierarchies and are able to place objects into different categories and subcategories.
•         Reversibility: This refers to an understanding or awareness that actions can be reversed. For instance, a kid might recognize that his dog is a German Shepherd, that a German shepherd is a dog, and that a dog is an animal.
•         Conservation: This stands for the understanding that when something changes in appearance or shape, it still remains the same. For instance, a kid will understand that an object’s mass doesn’t change even when it’s rearranged. This means a piece of chalk will still remain a chalk even when the lone piece is broken down into two equal parts. However, kids are able to understand some types of conservation (like mass) earlier than others (say, volume). To explain this (and some other) developmental inconsistencies, Piaget coined the term ‘horizonal decalage.’
•         Decentration: Kids at the concrete operational stage no longer focus on just a solitary dimension of any object (say, a glass’s height). Instead, they take into account the changes in other dimensions as well (such as the glass’s width). This facilitates the occurrence of conservation. 
•         Seriation: Concrete operational kids can organize objects along a quantitative dimension, such as weight or length, in a methodical way. For instance, they can methodically position a series of sticks having varying sizes, say either in ascending or descending order. However, when given the same task, younger children will approach it in a haphazard way.

Though these new cognitive skills improve a kid’s understanding of the physical world, Piaget said they’re still unable to think in abstract ways.

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The perfect example to mention centration is how a kid counts the number of a cake’s slices that each individual has on their platter rather than their sizes. Centration is crucial to comprehend personal needs and wants.

On the opposite lines of centration is the idea of decentration. Psychologists from across the world would agree that there’re some developmental milestones that a kid has to reach, and those time periods are crucial for that ability’s optimal development. If missed, the milestone might find a ground to stand on, but it’d be shaky. Every developmental stage that the kids pick up either help them grow behaviorally or cognitively. 

Decentration generally occurs during the cognitive development’s third stage, the concrete operational stage (ages seven to twelve years). As the kids start to apply logic and knowledge, they also learn to comprehend their environment’s elements better along with their functioning. This increases their ability to observe multiple viewpoints apart from their own ones. One can easily observe the reduction in centration from three key forms. 

Firstly, a young child might comprehend the idea that nothing is taken away or nothing has been added, so it remains the same. Secondly, the discourse of recompense might also be utilized, in which a child can understand that one glass’s height cancels out the other glass’s width. Finally, there’s a possibility of reverse arguments where a child might say both the glasses are the same as the water can be poured from the taller glass into the wider one to make them look equal. These arguments depend on logical operations, which are mental actions that can be reversed.

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Interestingly, research shows that kids who practice conservation tend to learn it more quickly, and kids who conserve perform better at particular mathematical tasks. Piaget’s seven conservation tasks that kids can practice include:

Number: In this task, kids are asked to compare rows of small objects.

Length: In this task, kids are asked to compare two identical objects’ lengths.

Liquid: This is the most popular of all of Piaget’s tasks. When kids get older, they learn that a key characteristic of liquid is that it alters shapes in accordance with the container it’s in.

Mass/matter: In this task, parents/teachers try to see if the kids recognize that an object still contains the same mass.

Area: This task needs slightly more prep than others. Kids who haven’t mastered conservation of area won’t recognize that the parents/teachers haven’t actually changed the area.

Weight: In this task, kids are asked to compare the weight of two objects.

Volume: This task is typically mastered last, usually between ages nine and eleven. Here, kids are asked to compare the increasing liquid level caused by adding objects to two containers filled with water.

Researchers have criticized multiple aspects of these conservation tasks. Rose and Blank argued that when a kid provides the wrong answer to a question, parents/teachers repeat the question to hint that the kid’s first answer was wrong. Piaget did the same thing by asking kids the same question twice in his conservation experiments.

When Rose and Blank did the same experiment but asked the question once, they found many more six-year-olds provided the right answer. This demonstrates kids can conserve at an earlier age than Piaget claimed. Porpodas found that asking multiple questions wasn’t actually the problem. This research noted that the questions generated “verbal interference” that prevented kids from transferring information across from the pre-transformation stage.

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Language development is a hallmark of the preoperational stage. During this stage, kids also become increasingly adept at utilizing symbols, as evidenced by increased pretending and playing. Role-playing also becomes vital during the preoperational stage. Kids often play the roles of “daddy,” “doctor,” “mommy,” and other characters.

Piaget used different clever and creative techniques to study children’s mental abilities. One of the popular techniques to exhibit egocentrism included using a mountain scene’s three-dimensional display. Also known as the “Three Mountain Task,” kids are asked to select a picture that displayed the scene they had observed. Most kids can do this with little difficulty. 

Next, kids are asked to choose a picture displaying what somebody else would’ve observed when seeing the mountain from another viewpoint. Invariably, kids almost always select the scene displaying their own view of the scene. According to Piaget, kids experience this difficulty because they cannot take on somebody else’s perspective. Developmental psychologists consider the ability to comprehend that other people have different thoughts, perspectives, mental states, and feelings as the theory of mind.

Another popular experiment involves demonstrating a kid’s comprehension of conservation. The same amounts of liquid are poured into two similar containers in one experiment,. Then, one container’s liquid is poured into a differently-shaped container. Kids are then asked which container holds the most liquid. Despite seeing the liquid amounts were the same, kids almost always select the container that appears fuller. Piaget performed several similar experiments on the conservation of mass, length, number, quantity, volume, and weight. He observed that few kids displayed any comprehension of conservation before the age of five.

Much of Piaget’s concentration at the preoperational stage focused on what kids couldn’t yet do. The concepts of conservation and egocentrism are both focused on abilities that kids haven’t yet developed. However, not everybody agrees with Piaget’s evaluation of kids’ abilities. For instance, researcher Martin Hughes argued that kids failed at the three mountains task because they didn’t understand it.

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